


i'll burn it all just to light your eyes

by nezstorm



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, Future Fic, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Mates, Mating Bond, Psychic Bond, Temporary Character Death, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-16
Updated: 2018-11-16
Packaged: 2019-08-24 06:26:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,607
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16634696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nezstorm/pseuds/nezstorm
Summary: "Where the fuck is he?!" Stiles practically roared swinging his hand to the side and destroying the cabinet. The living-room was practically gone now, turned into a heap of rubble. A small price to pay though, if it meant Stiles kept to inanimate objects as his power soared with his emotions. Peter would find it amusing, for certain, but Peter wasn’t there.





	i'll burn it all just to light your eyes

**Author's Note:**

> just another old thing.

"Stiles. Stiles you have to stop!" 

 

Derek ducked as another chair crashed into the wall, a whirlwind of splinters joining the rumble circling the air around Stiles, his magic furious and out of control.

 

"Stiles, stop!"

 

"Where the fuck is he?!" Stiles practically roared swinging his hand to the side and destroying the cabinet. The living-room was practically gone now, turned into a heap of rubble. A small price to pay though, if it meant Stiles kept to inanimate objects as his power soared with his emotions. Peter would find it amusing, for certain, but Peter  _ wasn’t there _ .

 

"I can’t--" He choked up and dropped his arms, a vase stopping mid-air and crashing to the floor with him, legs finally giving out. "They cut me off, Derek! They cut me  _ off _ . I can’t even sense him anymore!” Stiles covered his face with his hands, rubbing furiously to hold back tears of frustration and fear.

 

"I can’t feel him,” he whispered. He kept trying to reach out for the thread that connected him to Peter, kept looking for him with all his senses. They’ve been bonded only for a year, but Stiles had never felt so alone. So bereft without Peter’s presence at the back of his mind. “He could- he could be dead and I wouldn’t even know. I wouldn’t  _ know _ . Derek.”

 

Strong hands clamped on his shoulders holding him together and he looked up at the  werewolf crouching in front of him.

 

"We’ll find him, Stiles. We will. Alive and asking what took us so long. You know him. He’s pretty immune to death."

 

His choked up laugh turned into a sob as he dropped his head to Derek’s shoulder.

 

\---

 

They’ve been together for over two years when Peter finally asked. Finally because Stiles anticipated it for weeks now. There was no dramatic build up, no romantic set up, no heavy moods or apparent nervousness. He asked him while they were having breakfast at their apartment.

 

“Stay.”

 

_ Stay with me. Stay mine. _ Was what he really meant, but Stiles knew. He knew his wolf and how to read the omissions and where to look for them. Learned all the frowns and angles of Peter’s mouth. Memorized the variety of Peter’s smirks, all the colors of Peter’s huffs. The difference between eye rolls. So he knew.

 

And Stiles didn’t care much for things like marriages. Formalities, paperwork and signatures, receptions for relatives neither of them had much of. But this, this he wanted. He wanted a life with Peter and all that came with loving a werewolf while not being one. He wanted to belong to Peter completely and Peter to be his as well and  _ feel it  _ in the marrow of his bones.

 

So there was no blip in his heartbeat, no shade of doubt in his eyes, no quiver in his voice when he told Peter:

 

“Yes.”

 

_ Till death. _

 

\---

 

Stiles knew many different kinds of pain. Running with werewolves came with a price, after all.

 

He suffered broken ribs, broken wrist, sprains, burns. There were concussions and shiners, a broken nose. He’s been stabbed, shot repetitively. Tortured that one time. Everything that comes with being a human part of a werewolf pack living on a hellmouth.

 

He knew the difference between stabbing a toe against the bed frame and breaking it while trying to kick the door in. Knew how painful a fall was; both from the stairs and through a window. Knew how it felt when a bullet pierced him through. Or when a knife sliced him open.

 

He carried scars that were battle wounds in truth, his skin marred in places like shattered glass haphazardly put together.

 

He knew levels of pain from a dull ache to gut wrenching agony.

 

But no pain he ever felt could compare to the lightning flare of a wolfsbane-laced arrow embed in Peter’s left shoulder. So close to the heart. Nothing could measure up to being able to feel your mate’s stomach being slashed open.

 

His mind couldn’t handle the convulsing red burn coming through the bond. The pain wasn’t his which meant his body couldn’t help him fight it, couldn’t numb him. Carry him through.

 

Not the first few times. Not until Peter taught him to block it and send his own strength back.

 

He thought that that was it. That was agony at its highest. The worst he’d ever feel.

 

And then they took Peter.

 

\---

 

Stiles has been training with Deaton ever since he blew up a kelpie in anger and despair with a twitch of his hand when it got a bit too familiar with Scott’s insides. He had four years of grinding the vet for every bit of information. Hundreds of books and some passages carved into memory. Hours of mixing herbs, drawing sigils. Days of learning how to concentrate on a single thought until he could call himself in control. Months of materializing images from his mind.

 

His rage was pure white and blazing with a temperature so low the ground froze beneath his feet with every new step. His breath came out in puffs of rushed air as he seethed silently until the moment he found his tormentors. Found the ones who trapped his heart.

 

With a roar he swept his arms out the moment they came at him. Four men, a woman, a witch – all of them trapped with the power of his fury, pressed against walls and ceilings. Compressed.

 

He dragged it out as much as he could; crushed them slowly, at a steadily lazy pace because he wanted them to suffer. Meant to cause them unimaginable pain.  _ Willed them _ to die with skin constricting them within, bones breaking under the pressure. The sound of collapsing rib cages, one pelvis snapping after another, crunching skulls. Blood oozed from pores, colored the floor until it froze like everything else beneath him.

 

Cold like the bond that didn’t snap back into place with the death of the witch. Like the emptiness of his heart.

 

\---

 

"I think I’m gonna be sick," Isaac muttered through clenched teeth and backed out a bit from the cellar, but Stiles barely even registered his words.

 

All he could hear was his raspy breath, his thundering heart, blood pumping in his veins so loudly he could practically feel it. Peter was there, right there in front of him, but he made no sound. His mate was so close yet Stiles couldn’t sense a thing, neither a murmur of presence, nor a lingering breach to his thoughts. Nothing, not even a glimmer and he’d panic could he not see Peter’s chest heaving with each labored breath.

 

They spent so long looking for him that even though Stiles never lost hope, his determination never wavered, it became a bit like a dream that would never come true. A goal forever to be chased. A never ending nightmare.

 

Yet here they were, two months stretched into agony without Peter at his side, and Stiles was still cut off from him. Still unable to feel the pain his werewolf must be in, unaware of all the wounds, cut off from him. Still unable to feel the pain his werewolf must be in, unaware of all the wounds, all the suffering the man went through until they found him.

 

He couldn’t decide what hurt him more.

 

After what felt like eternity of looking at Peter’s wounded form, Stiles fell to his knees at Peter’s side. Carding his fingers through hair mated with blood and grime he pressed his forehead against the wolf’s and breathed in deeply.

 

All that mattered right in this moment was that Peter was alive, that Peter was still there, connection severed or not. And Stiles wouldn’t let anything or anyone take his wolf away from him ever again.

 

\---

 

“There’s nothing to fix,” Deaton said.

 

And the world collapsed around Stiles.

 

\--

 

“What do you mean there’s nothing to fix? They were bonded for a year; it couldn’t just go away like that. There’s surely a way you can unblock it, right?” Derek argued, looking between Deaton’s grave expression and Stiles’ pale face. “Take the curse down or something. Mix a potion, cast a spell in Gaelic or Latin. Restore their bond.”

 

Stiles observed him numbly from the chair he collapsed into after the meaning of Deaton’s words finally registered. He knew it was his silence that unsettled Derek so much, drove the pitch of his voice higher as the werewolf demanded a solution from the vet. Derek did what he thought Stiles should be doing right now. Panicked because he knew that everything was lost and he denied to believe it.

 

Because there was no solution. There was nothing they could do.

 

“There is no curse, Derek. The bond had been properly severed,” Deaton replied in a gentle voice and Stiles watched Derek’s eyes widen in horror, mouth open with a question he couldn’t bring himself to ask.

 

“All the hunters did with the bond was mute the connection between Peter and Stiles as to prevent you from finding them too soon. Because even though the torture Peter was subjected to would make Stiles suffer as well, not as severely of course, he’d still be able to tell you where to find his mate. The bond was broken the way all bonds are at one point or another. By death.”

 

\---

 

The first morning after the mating, when the bond settled between them Stiles couldn’t tell what was his and what was Peter’s and it threw him completely off balance. He woke up dizzy with a headache and a swarm of stinging bees buzzing in his head. Peter woke up right after him reacting to his pain with an aggressive snarl that both warmed Stiles’ heart and made him ache even worse.

 

The moment Peter seemed to realize what was happening the buzzing died down to a gentle purr.

 

Peter had explained the nature and workings of the bond beforehand, how it would be harder on Stiles since he was human and couldn’t experience pack bonds the way werewolves did which gave Peter an advantage. It sounded like a challenge then, Peter somewhat ridiculing the idea to make it easier for Stiles to back out if he wasn’t ready.

 

But Stiles wanted to give Peter at least that much since the Bite was out of the question. Wanted to give himself that much.

 

Peter guided him through it all, clamping down on his own emotions and letting them through one at a time allowing Stiles to familiarize himself with them, embrace them, return them in kind.

 

They started easy. With comfort, contentment, safety, irritation, boredom. A bit of gloom. It took some getting used to, but the bond gave him so much, Peter so much more open to him. It felt  amazing, especially when Stiles’ happiness resulted in Peter sending the emotion right back doubling it in force.

 

When it came to stronger feelings like lust, Stiles had to fight for every semblance of control not to come right there. The sense of  _ wantneedmoreyes  _ was so heady and intense they had to stop the session if only to relearn the way their bodies fit together with the bond buzzing in their minds.

 

But it was love that rattled Stiles the most.

 

They never said the words, never needed them to know, but knowing it’s there could never come even close to feeling it there.

 

\---

 

There was a void now, inside of Stiles. A sense of… desolation when he looked at Peter and saw him smirk or frown, but he couldn’t feel it. He couldn’t feel the languorous warmth seeping through his joints that he came to identify as fondness and affection even though it should have been there. It should have been there when Peter’s blue eyes studied him, when Peter’s lips quirked the tiniest bit as Peter fought not to smile at Stiles’ ill timed joke. It should have been there when Peter trailed his fingers down his cheek, over the line of his neck.

 

His stomach did fill with butterflies, quivering and warm, but it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the same because it was only him now in his head, it was only his reaction to Peter’s gaze, Peter’s words, Peter’s everything. The overpowering sense of belonging was there, but was different, frayed. Torn in half.

 

He was content and he wasn’t. He was wanted, but he had to see it in Peter’s eyes, sense it through the heated kisses. He was loved yet it didn’t taste the same.

 

He berated himself sometimes for missing the easiness that came with the connection, because now he couldn’t rely on emotions coming through the bond, he couldn’t sense oncoming frustrations and sadness and nip them in the bud. He had to learn how to speak Peter again, like he used to before.

 

He missed Peter. He missed him though he was there, at his side and going through the same thing even though it would always be different for the wolf. Always easier in a sense because werewolves could still smell emotions, focus on the staccato of human hearts. They could still know, Peter would still know. It was as much easier as it was harder, because Peter felt the loss like a loss of a pack member, like a severed limb.

 

But Peter also died that day even if just for a moment and that was all Stiles needed to remind himself of to forge on and learn how to open himself up more. Open himself up again.

 

\--

 

“You don’t have to stay,” Peter told him, finally awake and with his wounds healed. Or at least the ones that could still heal.

 

Stiles was at his side, lived on the chair by the bed for all the days it took for Peter to wake, all the hours it took for him to open his eyes. Now Stiles could finally breathe again.

 

For a flare of a moment he tried to reach out, gauging Peter’s emotions through the bond more than an instinct by now. Still one. He struggled not to flinch at the void of things he couldn’t feel.

 

But Peter was  _ still there _ .

 

He understood what Peter was telling him even without the bond because the bond used to be there. He knew where he was coming from, but he couldn’t accept it. Stiles never went back on his word.

 

“I promised you,” was Stiles’ reply. Because he loved him before the bond, loved him through it, loves him now. “I promised to stay. Till death.”

 

“I died,” Peter stubbornly replied and Stiles knew that Peter was giving him an out because he cared, because he too was hurting. He could be stubborn too.

 

“So did I.”  _ With you _ .

 

“You’re still here.”

 

“And so are you. Do you want me still?” Stiles asked though he knew. Knew by the way Peter’s eyes never left his, knew by the fingers clutching at his in a vice like grip. Would know even without those tells if only by the pain lacing Peter’s voice.

 

“You know I do.” It was a hushed whisper when Peter replied. Voice soft because Peter wasn’t to be defeated. For Stiles to prove his logic wrong.

 

Stiles knew all this because he knew Peter. Spent years learning him before they were bound together for a time that was supposed to last far longer than this. It hurt, the loss. It was a tangible pain. But it would hurt more to let all they still had go when neither of them wanted to leave.

 

So Stiles asked him, asked him like Peter did that day.

 

“Stay?”

  
  



End file.
